shakespearemom

I just finished the climax for my novel, and I announced to everyone what I had done–and since we are on vacation, that included lots of family. Some relatives just rolled their eyes (or acted like I had not said anything), but my husband was really happy. Then, however, he was really confused, for my next sentence was, “Wow, I might actually get this draft done in the next week or so.”

He said, “But I thought you just said you were done.”

“No, I said I’d finished writing the climax.”

“Isn’t that the ending?”

“No.”

“It isn’t?” He obviously didn’t believe me, but I reminded him of the theatre class we took together in college–the only class we took together–listing out the major movement of a story: Exposition, Inciting Incident, Rising Action, Climax, Falling Action, Denouement.

“You see, I have quite a bit to do now that the climax has happened,” I told him.

Rather than telling you what to do with your falling action and denouement, though, I would like to ask what you like as a reader. And be as honest as you can. So, here it is:

What do you like to happen after a climax? What is too much? What too little? What will leave a bad taste in your mouth? What will leave you unsatisfied? Give me examples, and perhaps I’ll add my own two cents in tomorrow’s blog.

Let me tell you about a common paper I receive from English students:

The essay is about a car accident, and the student sets up all the action by describing his/her morning in excruciating detail–what kind of toothpaste was used to brush teeth, the exact words spoken between him/her and parents, what was playing in the car radio, etc. 

And then the accident happens, as suddenly and without warning as it did in real life. In a sentence or two, the person is knocked unconscious. Then, since the student no doubt wants to end the paper because the climax is finished, he/she briefly states what parents and friends say when he/she wakes up in the hospital. End of paper. 

It’s the same problem I see in paper after paper, but it doesn’t just happen in freshman essays. I see it in novels, screenplays, plays–but even in shorter works. It’s the tendency for a writer to reflect “real time” in her work, and it comes from the assumption that, for writing to be “real,” it has to be kept as close as possible to the way things really happened. 

But writers have a wealth of tools at their disposal, and one of the greatest of these is time manipulation. I contend that this manipulation is not only preferable, but essential to accurately reflecting what what is writing about. 

Here are my rules for time: 

1.  Unless something is important, it should be shortened considerably. In other words, unless your toothpaste brand–or even the fact that you brushed your teeth–has a direct effect on the rest of your story, it needs to be left out entirely. Just kill it. Movies do this well, ignoring bathroom breaks, most meals, etc. Who really cares what you ate at lunch, unless it specifically comes up (literally) later on, unless it has an effect on someone’s mood, on a relationship, something with some relevance.

2.  Less important elements should be sped up. Days can pass quickly, or weeks, months, years, with very little comment, if what happens in them does not pertain to where your work is going. If it isn’t important, and you spend chapters and chapters on it, all you will do is reflect the lack of tension involving the characters. In other words, you will bore us.

3.  The really important stuff–major climaxes, extraordinarily important exchanges or events–those elements should be slowed down. Not put in real time, but slowed down, sometimes so that a 15-page chapter reflects only a minute of actual time. You see, in a car accident, though the action of it takes only a second or two, describing it that way negates the power of the climax completely. One look between the two soon-to-be lovers should take paragraphs to describe in infinite detail. 

In effect, you the writer are manipulating time to show us what is important in your work. A brief exchange shows something isn’t highly important, while an in-depth, time-slowed description lets us know when to dig in and really pay attention. 

Look through the scenes you are writing. When do you slow down what should be sped up? When do you give too much detail to the trivial? Where do you need to set your heels in and flesh an event out far more.

Don’t neglect your climax by trying to hurry it up. Use time in your favor.

Some might call it mere worry, this tendency of ours to plan and plan, practice and practice, all for something that never happens.

I’ve been doing quite a bit lately, and I’ve done some major things in the past as well that fit the pattern:

1. I made tons of cookies for my daughter’s cookie party, but most went to waste because the snow kept most people away.

2. I’ve practiced HOURS a day to play Christmas songs for church services, but the last three services (Sunday, Christmas Eve, and Christmas morning) have all been cancelled. I’m missing the next Sunday (we were delayed going to family for Christmas), and the following Sunday is Epiphany, meaning I won’t have any reason to play Christmas stuff.

3.  I once wrote two poems to inspire a music professor to write a song for a benefit concert. He then flaked and didn’t compose anything at all (let alone use either of the poems).

4.  I have now nearly finished my third novel, yet so far none have earned me a cent for all the years it took to write them. 

I’ve also done all sorts of other prep work for stuff that never happens. Now, you might think, what a waste! You might consider the option of not preparing anything, just in case your efforts are wasted. 

But is anything ever truly wasted? If my novels never get published, does that make writing them not worth it? Didn’t it still give me something, if nothing more than a chance to dream, to escape my current reality, or lessen my own insanity? The two poems I wrote were both good, and each poem I write makes me (slowly) a better poet, helps me be more aware of the movement involved in language, on its images and sound patterns.

Even if practicing Christmas music doesn’t mean I play much of it in church this year, I always have next year, and I have music in my own home until then. The truth is, I love to play piano, and I love it even more if I play it well, and I won’t get there unless I practice, and practice, and practice. My efforts simply can’t be a waste, for they make me better, little by little. Who knows what a year more of practice will do for me?

I suppose my only question for myself is this: When do I not make the effort I should because I fear it will be wasted? 

I know the answer to that question, and it may very well show up on tomorrow’s blog. Do you have your own answer? What do you regret not trying? 

Just in case you thought my blog was predictable, that I was the equivalent of Jane Austen, all thought, no hormones, here I am to shake things up a bit. I was intrigued by the top ten lists on JD’s I Do Things blog, I thought I’d make one of my own. 

You see, I was blessed with one (likely final) episode of Crusoe, literally the ONLY show I regularly watch on television. A previous blog I wrote discussed why I liked it, but to sum up, it was:

1. Not the writing.

2. Not gripping plot.

3. Not the well-known actors.

4. Not the tremendous special effects.

I could go on with all the other elements the show doesn’t have, but if you read the title of this post, you’ll already know: Beefcake, plain and simple. Okay, yes, the costumes help, since I’m a natural born costumer and sucker for beautiful clothes. But until this show came around, I didn’t realize how much of a sucker I was for beautiful men. 

And why is that exactly? Why has it taken me this long to realize my own level of testosterone increases with a cute guy around? Perhaps part of it that, for nearly 20 years, I’ve had my own beefcake. My hubby’s pretty darn cute, the tall, dark, handsome type. He even wears a beard, mainly because I love beards. 

But there hasn’t been enough beefcake on TV, at least not on Prime Time. You see, women are more complex than men. We can enjoy the way a guy looks, but if he’s a creep, we will gradually see him as only a creep, negating any beefcakeyness he might otherwise have had. And, typically, a really cute guy is stereotyped either as narcissistic or so stupid he might as well be a rock. For some reason, while a woman is stereotyped as worthless if she isn’t pretty (with very few exceptions), beautiful men can’t be trusted. If they are that pretty, they have to be significantly flawed. 

Let me see if I can come up with two lists. The first, the top ten Cute and Nice Guys (on television):

1.  Robinson Crusoe (you have to see it if you haven’t), played by Philip Winchester

2.  Gray’s Anatomy… but only Dr. McDreamy (although I like him best in Enchanted)

3.  Um… well… 

You see, I can’t think of anybody else. I have even tried to think of past shows, but Bo and Luke Duke never appealed to me, and David Hasselhoff? Bbbllecccchhh! I remember liking the show BJ and the Bear, but I can’t even remember what the guy looked like. And as a kid I loved Buck Rogers, but he wasn’t exactly the ideal beefcake either (though I did catch a marathon of that show a few months ago…and I love the one where he was captured and auctioned off). The old Battlestar Galactica had two sort of beefcakes, but Apollo was too stiff, and Starbuck too much of a lady’s man (remember the stereotype?).

I know the beefcake is out there, waiting for an acting job. I just need to get through to TV producers to let them know what I want. 

Requirements for Truly Delectable Beefcake:

1.  A good, emotive face. 

2.  Kindness/sensitivity (and not just to a woman when he’s in love with her).

3.  Heroism (yes, he needs to face tough stuff, and that doesn’t mean choosing between 2 women).

4.  Intelligence (His voice has to sound intelligent, too, not just say smart things. For me, that means Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger are out.)

5.  Vulnerability (no man is always strong… just ask Mr. Incredible, or Spiderman)

6.  A sense of isolation, even if he has friends (think Harry Potter)

7.  Honesty/honor

8.  Loyalty (to a woman, to friends, etc.)

9.  Good clothes (and, yes, 18th century coats and half-open shirts work better than underwear. My imagination works great, thanks. Often better than the original.)

10.  A great body (even a good body would work, if he has the other stuff)

So there it is, my testosterone-laden entry for the year. I might do a second one on films, but right now I need to go snuggle with my own beefcake. Think I could get him in a pirate costume?

Okay, so I think this is the second time I’ve gotten the Lemonade award, shown here:  Only, the first time I got it, I was a bonehead who didn’t know how to put anything but words into my blog. So here goes:Who nominated me?Flitting (one of my first regular readers) and Unorthodox Chef (can’t wait to try her pizza dough).And whom do I nominate, in turn?

Oh, where to begin. I love all of you! But I especially love:Rocketscientist (the genius of the family, and of the web)

Exchange of Realities (another genius, though no relation)

I Do Things So You Don’t Have To

Dark Passenger

Write More

Book Publishing

Writely Applied

My Life as Stori

Write More

Chronicles of Caelan

Writing for Your Life

Write 4 Money

and 

Working Wifey

Some older blogs (old by months, mind you), some new…all worth reading!

Okay, so the rules…for those of you who received the award (unless this is the second or third time you received it, and you did the right thing the first time)…

1) Display the logo somewhere on your blog, even if it is only in the post acknowledging the award.

2) Nominate your favorite blogs, at least 10 of them. You can nominate them for any reason you want but they must display attitude or gratitude!

3) Link to your favorite blogs and give them a little link love.

4) Tell them all about the award you have given them and a little about what it means to you.

5) Link to the person that nominated you as well to show a little love to the person that loves your blog so!

It certainly is nice to be recognized! (Honestly, it’s nice that someone reads my blog once in a while. I feared weeks would go by without a nibble. So, happy nibbling–and if you really want to nibble, try some of the recipes on Unorthodox Chef’s website.

Oh, and I also got the Super Scribbler Award last week (okay, almost two weeks ago, *sigh*), but I haven’t figured out all the Scribbler rules, so that will come later! 

I took my children to a newly constructed ramp in the snow yesterday. One of my good friends here, rather than using a snow shovel to shovel out his driveway, chose, instead to leave his drive alone, but to construct a 3 1/2 foot high slide (smart man). You see, even though my world is covered with about 2 feet of packed snow right now, I also live in a flat area, an area of town which 15 years ago was nothing but strawberry fields. Thus, even with all this delicious snow, I have nowhere to sled. 

My son was a natural, climbing up to the top of the sled ramp–a dangerous feat even for a kid twice his age–and taking off with abandon. My daughter was infinitely more cautious. And I believe I was more cautious than both of them put together. But after a few tries, we all took to the new situation fine. 

Yet in our real lives, how well do we follow that example? I cannot tell you how many times I have turned down an opportunity to try something new. But I also can’t tell you how many times I HAVE tried something, and discovered a whole new world I’d never imagined. 

Believe me, some attempts didn’t go so well. I tried out skiing several years ago, and, frankly, I detested it. I intend NEVER to go out skiing again. I like snow in hour-long spurts at most, and the only thing worse than falling on one’s rear end and not being able to get up again without help is that day Flit describes, where she spends the whole day waiting. I cannot possibly express the depth to which skiing repulses me. 

At the same time, with my writing, I’ve taken all sorts of chances. Even blogging was a stretch for me. Though I teach essay writing, I don’t write creative nonfiction all that often. But my fiction writing blends well into all of this, and I find that, not only do I never run out of topics, but I usually feel pretty good about each day’s finished product. 

Writing a novel involves taking a huge chance, and spending months and months on that chance. I spent a year researching and writing a book on ghosts, hoping it would someday make a little money, and it has… but that was a huge risk of both time and money. And it isn’t just writing. I have an episode in my current novel where my protagonist learns to ride a motorcycle. So, guess what? I have to do the same thing. And as soon as this snow melts… I’m going for a few rides. Just the thought of it gives me the heebie-jeebies, but I’m still going to do it.

I gave an assignment to a writers group once: I told them to write something in a genre they would never in their wildest dreams have attempted. Some people wrote poems for the first time in their lives, I tried out romance (Bleccchhh!), but one brilliant writer wrote what he called a “zombie screenplay,” fashioned after some sort of cross between Night of the Living Dead and Creature from the Black Lagoon. 

We read the screenplay as a group one night. It was scary. It involved a lot of zombie moaning. It was absolutely hilarious. And none of us knew Matt had it in him to write something like that. Including Matt.

So, what might you try? What have you always considered beyond you? Could you, perhaps, spend just one day on it, or even an hour, and see how it suits you? Might you try poetry for once, or YA, or horror? Playing piano, tennis, or raquetball? Don’t worry about falling flat on your face, getting snow up your nose, or getting a stomach ache from the nerves. Just try it. 

You might like it.

I’ve been Microsoft free for a while now, and I am still learning the ropes of Mac programs. Given how slow I am at all things electronic, this process might take a while. 

One such transformation has been from Word to Mac’s Pages program, and only yesterday I found a way to paginate my current novel. Until then, I would count the number of pages I’d written for the day by scrolling up to where I’d begun, and counting down from there. Three was my minimum to be able to blog on any given day (and that is why I can write before 8 a.m. today–I’ve already written four, just since 6 this morning!), but I wasn’t keeping a running tally. 

Yet here it is: I had 87 pages completed when I made the switch over, at Thanksgiving, and I have since written 95 pages! Yes, I am on page 182! That means I have written 95 pages in less than one month. (I would tell you the word count, but I haven’t figured out how to do that yet.)

Have I finished the novel yet? Nope. I still have ten days before the year comes to an end, but I am not confident that the novel will be finished by then. I cannot say I am disappointed, though. Twenty-three days, and 95 pages. That’s 4.13 pages per day, on average! Wow! How could I be unhappy with that?

Plus, I am really enjoying the story at it unfolds. Right now my protagonist, a 16-year-old who is trying to make it on her own once her druggie mother abandons her, is reading old love letters with a cute college student named Tucker. The scene is all innocence, filled with vulnerability and tenderness, a subtle, gentle courtship in an otherwise scary world. And she lives in a haunted house, but the ghost is safer than her own parents, a sanctuary for her, protecting her from yet another foster home. 

I think this is what people call success. Sure, I haven’t sold the novel yet. I’m not writing under a deadline so that I can ship the novel out to my editor on schedule. But I’m managing my other jobs (many other jobs), maintaining a good relationship with my husband, doing fabulously fun things with my kids, and also managing to write over FOUR pages a day! 

No wonder I’m happy. I can’t measure success through what others do for me (agents, publishers, etc.). My success is my own. It’s what I do that matters. 

How do you measure your success?

We were due for another big storm last night, so my husband–the thorough, anal retentive one of the two of us–spent the entire evening gathering food, putting frozen items in the fridge in the garage (where it would stay frozen even if the power went out, for the garage is FREEZING), setting out flashlights and candles, etc. 

Of course, I sat around, watching him, helping a little, but mostly thinking he was going into WAY too much. He looked at the stack of food on the counter, happy that we wouldn’t have to dig in the dark pantry to find anything. I reminded him (it was 9 p.m.) that we wouldn’t be eating until morning anyway, and by then, despite the storm, the sun would still come up enough for us to see. 

He looked at the food, nodded, and said, “You’re right.” Naturally, though, he made no move to put the items back. I knew there was no way the storm was going to be as desperate as he thought, and his running around the house started stressing me out more than I liked.

And this, naturally reminded me of my writing (doesn’t everything, you may ask, if you’ve read my other blogs). For even though some level of preparation is a good thing, when the preparation itself gets in the way of the writing, it is definitely not a good thing. After all the prep Richard made last night, the power never went out, the sky became light again, I still had the stove power capable of making myself a chai, and my kids had hot waffles for breakfast. 

If you are dying to get started, don’t pull yourself back with the thought that you have to write an outline before you start. If you are writing a short story or short play–or a poem, especially–you probably don’t need an outline at all. And if you are beginning a novel, you may be able to write several scenes–even key conflict scenes to encourage your writing with some exciting place to get to eventually–before you ever begin an outline. With my second novel, my outline was extremely brief, and I knew, when I started, only the premise of it, not where it was going to go. But I like the ending a lot, despite not having discovered what it was going to be until I was almost there. I couldn’t have planned that ending, for I didn’t know enough about my characters and the changes they would undergo until they experienced the events and changed on their own.

With the novel I’m currently doing, I have a few paragraphs describing what I want to happen by the end of the novel, but I am writing a chapter by chapter outline after I write each chapter. I’ve never written that way before, but it’s working this time. And the outline is there so that I know where something happened, so that I can look back at it and keep the continuity of the piece consistent. 

Let your writing dictate how much prep work you do. If having a plan helps you write faster, and write more to the point, then make one. If it gets in the way, or you sense you would not take risks or make changes as you write, or if the outline limits your creative spark or makes you dread writing, don’t make one. Toss an unhelpful outline out and go with the flow. (If you can’t bear to toss it, put it in another document, save it, and put it away.)

Do what works. That is the overriding rule of writing for me. And what works may change. Change with it. Do everything you can to adapt to what your story needs, to what you need as a writer.

Nine inches more of snow–NINE! My kids are home again today, and I need to give them a bath soon, but right now they are happily playing, and I just happily wrote another chapter for my book. I hope to write at least one more before the day is out.

The whole world is soft outside, at least from my perspective, powdery and fluffed up, the world of the Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man (without the creepiness). Or, perhaps, I cannot help but feel an eerie element to the snow. It makes the whole world look beautiful, makes the leafless trees look graceful, the conifers drooping gently. 

Yet the sky, nearly as white as the snow below, shades down to gray as it touches land. Color is absent, except in dark contrast with the sea of white. No footprints. No signs of life. Even the roads have only the rare set of tire tracks, the doorways half-buried in drifts of snow. Everyone inside, watching, waiting, their breath held to see whether the snow begins again. 

If anyone is there at all. The place feels deserted, each house isolated, each family disconnected from the others, as if they are the last surviving family left on the earth. And what if they were? What if the snow brought death with it? What if it did truly kill the rest of the world in a single day? Anyone who played in the snow felt the poison. It seeped into their snow angels, dripped between their socks and their skin, killing them in seconds. 

Only those who stayed inside, who did not touch the snow, survived. Yet even they succumbed when they returned to their cars, touching the poison as they opened their car doors. Who would survive this poisoning? Who could? Would the melting snow drift into the ground, contaminating the water system? What could save people from instant death? A drug? A food? Their own innate resistance to the poison, passed down through generations? Who would outlive this poison? 

This might make a good short story. 

(If only I could get my other novel finished!)

This morning’s 2-3 inches of snow, added to the 2-3 inches we received last Saturday (which has not melted off yet) reminds me of a topic I’ve played with quite a bit recently: perspective.

Let me tell you first that I love snow. Its whiteness is unrivaled, brightening the sky in the morning long before the sun is up, turning gold in the morning light, pink in the sunset, and sparkling diamond in the day, when skies are blue and clear. Snow outside, with a nice fire crackling in the fireplace, toasting marshmallows, hot apple cider, baking bread, a Christmas tree, Christmas lights on all the houses–all these elements work together to make a cozy day, even when schools close and kids are milling around the house, wondering what to do all day without class. 

But snow isn’t so great when one is driving home in it, stuck in traffic, driving four hours home (in what should be a 30-minute drive or less), or when one’s car breaks down, leaving one trapped in a snow bank, unable even to open one’s car door to get out, without food, without even a tissue for added warmth, far from home and not likely to get there any time soon.

And it isn’t fabulous when one is homeless, and the only barrier between the snow and one’s own thin clothing is a layer of wet cardboard, likely to collapse when the snow begins to melt and wet it further. Where might one find another cardboard box to replace it? Can I still feel my toes? Is there a way to plug up that hole in the sole of my shoe so the icy water doesn’t get in?

You see, it’s all a matter of perspective. A feast laid on the table at a restaurant is great for those sitting at the table–unless one of them just had their stomach stapled, and thus can’t enjoy it–or someone is watching the scene from outside, through the restaurant window, and starving–or the wife of the couple has just revealed that she wants a divorce (meaning neither person will enjoy the food)–or the food itself is tainted with E. Coli, soon to make both patrons very ill, and kill their 4-year-old child, who is eating with them. 

And (you knew this was coming) so it is with writing. A situation that might make the average character happy may devastate another character, depending on his or her backstory. A character’s view of the world, of herself, and of others significantly determines what actions the character takes, what the character says, and a character’s possible outcomes. 

At the same time, one’s readers have their own perspective, and their view of the world is also important, even if that view is something you will be arguing against as you write. Even if you don’t share the same perspective as those you hope will read your book, you need to know what their perspective is–to understand it as fully as you can–or you cannot possibly reach them. Don’t assume they love snow, don’t assume they lead lives just like yours, or have your experiences informing them the way you do. Link your world to your readers. Connect perspectives. 

Who knows? You might learn something, too. Don’t you have more still to learn?